Twenty Names
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: Light Yagami's class is selected for the Game. His weapon – chopsticks. The Death Note- left behind at his house under lock and key. His only ally- an invisible Shinigami who doesn't really care who wins. However, he did manage to save one single page that might hold perhaps twenty names and descriptions. But will that be enough to make it through this game?


**A/N:** Written for the Flt Green Room, adopt a plunny.

The plunny I adopted was the following:

Title: Twenty Names / Battle Royale crossed over with Death Note. / Adopted from McJunker

Light Yagami's class is selected for the Game. His weapon – chopsticks. The Death Note- left behind at his house under lock and key. His only ally- an invisible Shinigami who doesn't really care who wins. However, he did manage to save one single page that might hold perhaps twenty names and descriptions. But he has forty students trying to kill him, and there's the matter of collapsing the government as well.

So basically the title, fandoms and summary were all done for me. :D Though that has also restricted me a tad, but my muses jumped all over this idea…even though I had never even _heard_ of Battle Royale before.

And a big thank you to EHWIES for the help on the Battle Royale side of things. Sadly, it doesn't really show in this chapter…but it will!

* * *

**Twenty Names  
Chapter 1**

Most announcements were met with the dull mix of interest and lethargy, and the unexpected news of a field trip to Kitano Tenman-gu Shrine in Kyoto was no different. Perhaps a public school would have found some jubilance in their reaction, but the students of Daikoku Private Academy liked to think of themselves as more civilised.

It wasn't a particularly exciting field trip in any case; the teacher rattled on a little about the shrine's significance: how it was a popular tourist sight, and the major shrine dedicated to Sugawara no Michizane, the God of Learning – though he really was just a scholar in the end, Light reflected. A man from the 9th century immortalised by a blind horde of followers and the occasional worthy follower in between.

He was reminded of the devoted following Kira had managed to amass over the past. Reminded of those many blogs he'd scrawled through, only to find them all made up of much the same thing: blind masses who knew nor understood the depth of what he was trying to accomplish – that pure world free from crime or the taint that creatures of free will had left upon it.

Come to think of it, the field-trip would take at least three days out of his work towards that goal, and he pushed the irritation aside when he was called upon. A smile was showcased instead. Light Yagami was the model student after all; genius, class representative… He had a certain image to uphold, however the true him beneath those layers felt.

But years of hiding that true self beneath a multitude of layers had taught him to multitask, and his mind whirled with thoughts and strategies as he skimmed over the forms, then distributed them row by row. The papers said nothing the teacher had not already said, asking only for a signature to be returned by the end of the week. Something even the weakest of minds should be able to comprehend after reaching the final year of their secondary education, however the teacher was rattling out those instructions as if they were incapable of reading a simple sheet.

No-body said anything though; that small act of patronising them was forgiven much like everything else. Because that was one of the drawbacks of a private school when compared to a public one – however being patronised was far more appealing than the alternative ruckus that would have exploded from a public school class. Or so society dictated: a rich society like theirs wherein the nearest public school was at the very edge of the district, where the worst-kept houses and people wore. Because they lived in a perfect little world of their own, littered only by those news reports on the wide-screen that hounded them while walking to and from school, or work, or some place in between. Everything was that conveniently orientated; much of the crime he found was localised to certain areas, certain connections. Often he wondered if cleaning those places would fix the people who stemmed from that – but so far he hoped the young and malleable would change their ways and learn that crime did _not_ pay. That they would learn to live by the rules, so that the world could climb out of the hole it had fallen into.

But it was such a difficult task; every name had to be thought about, counter-thought, and then meticulously planned. He had to be sure – sure of the guilt, sure that the world had no use for such a person, sure that the death of that one would benefit many more. And so far it had been working as he thought – except when L had interfered.

Light could feel those cracks slipping into his mask, and he was all the more aware of them. The need for caution was stronger than ever now that the eyes of the greatest detective in the world were upon him, and he found more of his mind occupied in maintaining that mask than ever before. But no-one had noticed a change, a mark he took to mean his current success. No classmate had commented on him being any different than the norm they expected from him – even now, the boy in front of his desk commented on the light interest he pushed to the forefront of his mask. For someone had to appear interested after all, and it was a butterfly effect when the school's model student showed some interest in an otherwise uninteresting event.

And such things were catching, because by the time they finished school for the day and started the walk home, a simple scholarly shrine had been painted in far more vibrant – and false – colours.

* * *

Light wondered if L had taken to using the media for his purposes as well. As though his stunt with Lind L. Taylor was not enough the talk shows were all filled with Kira-related debates and discussions, half of which leaning on the negative side. He would very much have liked to ignore the entire debacle, but such shows could also provide a wealth of information about his enemies – and, if he was being watched, it would be suspicious if he did not follow the debate like the rest of the world.

Sayu had no such worries; she was more than happy to leave behind the usual debates on the Japanese schooling system and focus on a new and more interesting debacle. She had her head on his shoulder now, her favourite lounging place – and his as well, because Sayu was the perfect addition to his mask of normalcy, and her mindless chatter let him focus most of his mind on more pressing matters.

'I wonder if Kira's good-looking,' she said suddenly, staring at the image of a stick-figure someone had drawn. A child of five or six perhaps, because it lacked proportion, depth and any sense of realism. 'That looks like a child's impression of the devil.'

Light didn't think his sister was far off the mark; the picture had two protrusions from the head after all. Those could be horns, if he was willing to throw aside all methods of rationality when staring at the image – but then again, one could not expect much from a five year old he supposed.

Then Sayu suddenly laughed. 'They're not serious, are they?'

'Serious about what?' Light asked, though he thought he knew anyway, considering the announcer's words.

Sayu paraphrased them for him anyhow. '_That's_ their official sketch,' she chortled. 'Who have they got working for them? A panda?'

'Why a panda?'

Behind them, Light could hear the invisible form of Ryuk choking on his own laughter. That piqued his interest, because Ryuk had only laughed remotely like that during the Lind L. Taylor incident. But Light was doing nothing of the sort at that moment; he was simply watching TV with his little sister…

Then Sayu flicked the screen off. 'That's getting ridiculous,' she yawned.

Light agreed; drawings and speculations were one thing, but trying to colour it in? Preposterous, and that was supposed to be serious media?

'Anyway…' Sayu, instead of getting up, snuggled closer to her brother. 'What is this I hear about a field trip from tomorrow?'

'It's nothing interesting, Sayu.' Light gave a half-smile. 'It eats into our weekend after all.'

'Don't give me that.' She poked his cheek. 'Sure you lose the weekend, but you don't get back until Wednesday. _Wednesday_. That's three days of school you miss. Plus cram school.'

'That's right.' Though he had remembered. 'I'll need to remind Mum to call them.'

'Oh, I'm sure they'll mark you as present either way,' Sayu said airily. 'No doubt they'll find your ghost sitting in your usual chair and not notice it's not solid.'

Only Sayu would come up with a hair-brained idea like that, and Light let a small smile slip on to his face. She could liven things up; that was for sure, though he wondered where that would go in Kira's world.

'What do you think of Kira?' he asked suddenly.

She put on her "thinking-face" – a face that made most who saw it burst into uncontrollable giggles. Luckily, her family had become immune to it.

'Do you think they'll get rid of the new government?' she asked. 'It's not much fun how they're always grilling about education and all.'

It was comments like that that made Light wonder what planet his sister came from; did she never see those reports of crime on TV until Kira had arisen to quell them?

'Maybe,' Light replied. 'They do seem incompetent, don't they?'

It was worth thinking about anyhow…in the long run. Certainly not now.

'Mmm-hmm.' Apparently, Sayu had already lost interest in the conversation. 'Are you going to kiss your girlfriend goodbye before you leave?'

'I – err – ' It was a fast conversational trek, and Light doubted a "normal" person would have followed it very smoothly. 'Sayu, _please_ stay out of my dating life.'

Sayu left his shoulder to grin at him. 'Why?' she asked. 'Misa-Misa is _so_ cute, and she's interesting too.'

_Interesting how?_ Light wondered to himself, as Sayu stood and abandoned him with a wave. Though his sister was right in that he needed to call Misa before he left – but not for the reasons she had thought.

After all, who else could hide the absence of the true Kira, except for the Second Kira?

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**A/N:** I've brought up the timeline of Death Note a little. So the stuff with Lind L. Taylor has happened, but Light has become acquainted with Misa/Second Kira _before_ L comes to Japan. The reason for this is mainly to mask Light's absence when he's on his field trip.

This was mostly a Death Note chapter for two reasons; I haven't finished reading Battle Royale yet, and as far as setting up went, I figured the DN side of things was easier to manage on my part, while weaving the Battle Royale things in at a later time.


End file.
